The comedian talks about his new special, what he thinks of Louis C.K., food, his fake porn venture, and why he's so damn busy

Ever since James Brown relinquished the title of "Hardest Working Man in Show Business," it's been up for grabs. One recent, if seemingly unlikely, contender: Aziz Ansari. From his role on NBC's Parks and Recreation and his self-released stand-up special to movie roles and that goofy American Express ad, the South Carolina native is quickly becoming omnipresent. He is also, at the moment, touring across the country, which has brought him to this week's Moontower Comedy and Oddity Fest in Austin (sponsored in part by Esquire). We spoke to him over the phone about his fictional home state, the fear of growing up, and why writing stand-up is harder than it looks.

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ADAM K. RAYMOND: So I'm calling from the one place in the world where everyone in Pawnee [Parks and Recreation's fictional Indiana town] wants to be.

AZIZ ANSARI: Muncie?

AKR: No, Indianapolis. You know, where all the glamour is.

AA: Oh, oh.

AKR: Have you spent any real-life time in Indiana?

AA: I don't think I have. I'm doing Indianapolis on the tour, but I haven't been in Indiana much.

AKR: When you come here, you should eat this thing called a pork tenderloin sandwich. It's a slab of pork hammered into the size of a plate and deep-fried.

AA: Whoa, that sounds pretty crazy.

AKR: The craziest part is that it comes on a regular hamburger bun and extends out about five inches in all directions.

AA: Wow. Alright, I'll look into it.

AKR: So you're officially on your Buried Alive tour now. That means everything from the special you just released is retired, right? Is it hard to let the material go?

AA: By the time you record a special, you've been touring the material a while, and you've made it the best version it can be, so you're kind of ready to put it behind you.

AKR: Louis C.K. is doing a new hour every year. Is that what you're trying to do?

AA: I don't know about once a year. I don't get enough time, with filming Parks and Rec, to tour everywhere I want in a year. The last one I did was longer than a year so I could go to some cities I really wanted to go to. But I think everyone thinks Louis is a little out of control with how quickly he's turning over material. I saw him when he was editing the special [Live at the Beacon Theater], and I was like, "Dude, you hardly even toured this. You toured it for like three months. You need to go tour this." He was like, "I don't know. I just want to put it out."

AKR: Comics talk all the time about how crazy Louis is for doing that. What's so hard about it?

AA: You don't think it sounds hard? It's the hardest thing. I should hang up the phone.

AKR: No, no, that's not what I meant.

AA: To come up with a good hour of material is so hard. I mean, look at plays and stuff. They're still doing Death of a Salesman. It's the hardest thing to come up with an hour of material that can consistently keep people laughing. And are you just going to do it in one city and never perform it again? You want to tour it. That's the whole point. I mean, look at musicians. You go to any Jay-Z concert, and he plays his hits. Comedians don't have hits. You have to have a whole brand-new hour. You have no hits to rely on. It's the hardest thing.

AKR: I wasn't trying to say it sounds easy.

AA: It's just that, if you're a comedian, and you retire your material and start from scratch, it's fucking hard.

AKR: I get it. I mean, some guys tour the same material for years and years.

AA: People don't do that as much now. Yeah, some comedians will tour and do these classic bits all the time. But now with YouTube and Comedy Central, people see your stuff, and they don't want to hear you do that again.

AKR: How many minutes of material did you write for this tour?

AA: There's a lot of stuff that gets thrown out. It's constantly getting changed and crunched up and edited. It took eight or nine months to get an hour of really good stuff. I feel really good about this one. I think it's my best one. I think each one's better than the last, so I'm excited about this one.

AKR: Is there some kind of progression with Buried Alive?

AA: It's way different than the other hours. This one's a lot more focused on themes. It's about the fear of having kids and seeing your friends have kids. It's about marriage, and how hard it is to meet someone you really like. So it's three themes that are super-relatable, and that's a lot different from my other specials.

AKR: Is Buried Alive a reference to anything? It made me think of the Ryan Reynolds movie.

AA: Well, first of all, that movie's called Buried, so that might say something about its success.

AKR: Yeah, fair enough.

AA: It came from an idea to make the poster look like these old-timey magician posters. Then I just thought about calling it Buried Alive because that sounds like a magician show title. And it also fits the themes of the show — fear of adulthood and how your life changes after you have kids and get married.

AKR: Are you going to end up producing and releasing this one on your own, like the last one [Dangerously Delicious]?

AA: I don't know. I'm happy I did it, but I probably won't put out the next special for another two years. Who knows what the landscape will be at that point? It wouldn't really make sense for me to speculate.

AKR: You do a bit on Dangerously Delicious about porn Web sites, and you mention a fake one, "reallifedickparty.com." Have you actually visited it?

AA: Yeah, I think I had to buy that for legal reasons. I actually heard on Twitter from someone that he knew the porn scene I was talking about.

AKR: The thing about the donut?

AA: Yeah. I think that would be the craziest thing for me — if one day I meet some girl, and she's like, I'm the donut girl!

AKR: Speaking of donuts, you're pretty publicly into food. Shouldn't you be fatter?

AA: I have an amazing metabolism. I'm sure that'll be gone one day. But I like to exercise, too, so I don't think I'll ever get really fat.

AKR: Sounds like a good plan.

AA: Wait, so this is for Esquire, and you're in Indianapolis? Are you just visiting or something?

AKR: No. My wife got a job, and I moved out here for her. Great guy, right?